Southwestern Utilities Team Up on Massive Solar Power Project

December 12, 2007

The developers of a new solar plant in the Southwest might draw on solar trough technology, which uses curved mirrors to concentrate the sun's heat. See a larger version of this photo.Credit: Warren Gretz

A multi-state consortium of southwestern electric utilities joined
forces on December 6th to issue a Request for Proposals (RFP) for a large-scale solar power plant. The consortium members hope to persuade a
third party to build a 250-megawatt solar thermal power plant in
either Arizona or Nevada by 2012, in which case the utilities would
jointly buy all the power produced by the power plant. The solar
facility must employ concentrating solar power (CSP) technology, which
involves concentrating the sun's heat using either trough-shaped
mirrors, dish-shaped mirrors, or a series of flat mirrors that track
the sun in unison. If truly built to a 250-megawatt capacity, the
facility will be the largest solar power plant in either state. The
minimum project size that will be accepted under the RFP is 100
megawatts, and the consortium members will give preference to
facilities with thermal energy storage. To learn more about CSP
technology, see the CSP section of DOE's Solar Energy Technologies
Program Web site.

The utility consortium, dubbed the Southwest Energy Service Provider's
Consortium for Solar Development, includes the Arizona Electric Power
Cooperative, Arizona Public Service (APS), the Southern California
Public Power Authority, the Salt River Project (which provides power
to Phoenix, Arizona), Tucson Electric Power, and Xcel Energy (which
serves eight states in the West and Midwest), with APS coordinating
the project. The consortium will hold a bidder's teleconference in
January, and bids will be due on March 19th, 2008. See the
press release and the RFP on the APS Web site (PDF 171 KB).
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